Mirrored Destiny I: Rise of the Sith
by Mikells
Summary: The history of the alternate universe in Jedi Destiny 4-: Zak Arranda is awoken from stasis by Brakiss, 11 years after the Battle of Endor, and is trained alongside young Jaina Solo in the ways of the Force. After returning from a mission given to him by Brakiss, Zak's ambitions take an unexpected turn, and his mentor soon realises that waking him will prove a mistake.
1. Part 1

**Part 1**

**The Forgotten Son**

**15 ABY – 19 ABY**


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter**

**1**

**15:3:21 ABY:**

Air!

That was the first coherent thought that came to Zak Arranda's mind when consciousness flooded back to him. After a few more minutes in which he centred his thoughts, he looked around at the inside of the stasis tube. The exterior was frosted over, save for a spot right in front of his face that had been swept away by someone recently. The temperature inside the tube was starting to climb to something more tolerable than the chill that had frozen him, but it was still cramped—it wasn't built to hold a human.

A clank, and then another. The locking mechanisms popping. He recognised the sound. It was almost the exact inverse of what he had heard when Fenb Peub had sealed him inside and started the stasis cycle. His throat still felt raw from the screaming.

Another coherent thought.

How long had he been trapped here? Days? Weeks? Had Tash tried to free him? What about Deevee, his uncle's faithful assistant droid. Surely he had come looking for Zak—surely? Or he might have assumed the worst from the start and informed the authorities. Perhaps that was who had released him from his frozen prison cell.

Gloved fingers pried into the crack between the hatch and the casing and wrenched the door open roughly. Natural air washed over Zak then; damp, and smelling of mould and volcanic rock, but it was more welcome than the air recycled within the stasis tube. He barely paid any mind to the dying hum of the machinery shutting down, more intent on taking in great big heavy gulps of the new air as he fell forward. He crashed to his knees on hard rock when his leg muscles, disused for who-knew how long, could not keep him up any longer.

When he had satisfied himself with the hot, dry air of the Sullustan cavern he recognised, and he had the strength to do it, he lifted his head to take a look around. But there was no sign of DV-9, or any officials that had been brought to his rescue. In fact, he could see only two people, and one of them was a girl he judged no older than six standard years.

He didn't recognise them. Sure, there was something about the girl that gnawed on his still-sluggish mind, something that was somehow familiar, though he knew he had never met _her_ before. He realised soon enough that these two strangers had been the ones to rescue him from his cold hell, and he decided that anything they asked of him wouldn't necessarily be off-limits.

Muscles aching from that simple act of looking around, he dropped fully to the floor, tasted dirt on his lips.

"Help him up, Jaina," came a hard, deep voice he didn't recognise. He knew it had to be the older man that was with the girl—her father?

He waited, and though he didn't feel any hands grasping at his clothes, or arms wrapping around him to help him to his feet, he was lifted up from the ground. It boggled his mind. He could not recall putting any effort into the act of getting up. In fact, he would have been content to just remain on the ground for a few more years, just sucking in air.

When he was upright, he looked to the strangers again to see that the girl's eyes were slightly narrowed, and that her small hand was outstretched in his direction, her fingers splayed. He tried to speak, to ask them what was happening, but his throat still chafed from his protests, and his lips were slightly cracked, dry.

"Water, Jaina," the man said. He was standing nearby, mostly but not entirely obscured by shadows. "But be mindful how much you give him."

"Yes, Father," the girl replied.

She withdrew a small flask from her belt with her free hand and approached Zak slowly, as if to assure him that she wasn't a threat. Zak almost laughed at the thought; a girl as small as she, as young as she, couldn't possibly be a threat to him. But then he remembered that she was somehow holding him upright without even laying a hand on him. He wondered how that was possible, and he knew that if she could do that, she could do more.

Jaina stopped just before Zak, the top of her head barely past his waist, and he felt himself being lowered slowly until he was on his knees again, looking her right in the eyes.

She smiled. "Open up," she said.

It took Zak a few tries to open his mouth, but when he finally managed it, he was rewarded with the heavenly sensation of cold water dripping into his mouth and sliding down his throat. There wasn't much of it before the girl withdrew the flask, replaced the lid, and hung it from her belt again.

He swallowed the last few drops of water, and found that his muscles were slowly starting to gather strength, and that his throat, mouth, and lips were on the mind as well.

"Who are you?" he asked finally, unable to think of anything else.

The man reached up and scratched at an itch on his chin idly before stepping out of the shadows and smiling at Zak. He had close-cropped, dark blonde hair and high cheekbones. His eyes were dark blue, hard but not quite menacing. His teeth, which Zak could see through the smile, were straight, clean, and well maintained, so he knew that the man wasn't a resident of Sullust; the humans here seemed to forego basic hygiene.

Then he spoke in that deep voice again. "My name is Brakiss," he said, taking a couple of steps forward.

"How long …" Zak couldn't quite articulate the question, and he found that there was something else nagging at the back of his mind; some small voice that kept telling him that there was something he was forgetting, something more important than the identity of his saviour.

"According to the records on the control board, you have been locked in the pod for the past eleven years."

"E–e–eleven years?" Zak stammered. "Then Deevee didn't find you? He didn't find me?"

He felt something strange then. It was almost like something invisible brushing gently against the inside of his head, touching memories. "No," the man called Brakiss replied, almost sympathetically. "And I cannot say I know what became of the droid in the time that you were here. What is the last thing that you remember?"

Zak thought about that for a moment. He remembered his uncle's murder on the landing platform the afternoon Fenb had betrayed him. The memory sent a spike of anger through him, and he vowed that, when he sufficiently recovered, if he ever caught up with Alitha, she was going to pay for what she had done. He remembered being found, covered in Shi'ido blood and remains by the planet's security division, remembered dimly being taken away and questioned for hours without end. They'd known of his innocence, but they hadn't counted on him being too shocked to be able to cooperate with them and give a description of the culprit. Then he remembered being picked up by—

"Tash!" He whirled around to face the other two pods, breaking free of whatever invisible force held him in place. He crashed forward again, braced himself against the ground with his palms.

The pod on the far end had been smashed by a boulder. Its frame was twisted, and shards of plexiglass lay all around it, ready to stab unsuspecting passers-by. The one closest to his was in similar shape, though not by similar cause.

Plexiglass lay everywhere and the frame around the hatch was twisted and warped—by what he couldn't even guess. Wires and power chips were visible, fried and broken, from a dozen different places.

And inside the pod, he could see the motionless form of his sister. Her long, blonde hair was limp around her shoulders, and her normally sparkling blue eyes stared out at him, cold, lifeless, without the spark he remembered in his day to day life.

"No!" he gasped in disbelief. The realisation hit him slowly, painfully, and his stomach twisted itself into a hundred knots. Hot tears stung his eyes, and he found himself trying to get back to his feet so he could cross the space between them.

A strong arm looped under his own and around his back; Brakiss helped him to his feet and, seemingly knowing what it was that he was after, guided him closer to the broken stasis pod. Zak was let down gently, and he crawled the remaining meter until he could reach through the shattered plexi for his sibling. He pulled her slowly, and with difficulty lay her across his lap, cradling her, hoping against all reason that she would spring to life in that moment just because he wanted it to happen.

But he knew that she wouldn't. He'd finally lost the last of his family, now. First Alderaan had been destroyed, and then his second cousin on Coruscant who had spoken out against the Emperor after the Death Star's demonstration, and then Mammon Hoole on Sullust at the hands of the woman Zak had trusted … even cared for. Now Tash was gone, her life snuffed out by something or someone unknown. And why?

Why did she have to die? The Empire had been defeated! Why couldn't he make it happen? Why didn't he have that power?

Anger welled up inside of him, and he turned his gaze on Brakiss. He glared, his teeth clenched tight and his eyes narrowed. And suddenly, without Zak knowing how it happened, Brakiss was lifted off his feet and sent flying across the cavern. He crashed hard into the rock wall on the other side, and Zak heard the sound of breaking bones before he turned back to Tash and brushed a lock of her beautiful golden hair away from her face. He gently closed her eyes and then looked back up at Brakiss.

"Why?" he demanded.

The man hesitated. "I did not kill her," Brakiss said, pushing himself back to his feet and hissing as a spike of pain shot up from his wrist. Zak could somehow feel it, but felt nothing akin to sympathy. He adjusted his hold on Tash, clutched her tighter.

"Liar!" he hissed.

"He didn't do it!" the little girl, Jaina, said stubbornly from only a meter away. Zak glared at her too, but found himself unable to feel any hostility towards her. Whether it was because she was so young, or because of the look on her face, he just couldn't.

He turned his gaze back to Brakiss, the hate starting to melt. "Who did it? Who and why?"

In response, Brakiss lifted his good arm and gestured to his side. He flicked his wrist toward Zak, who watched as another lifeless body—this one clad in the tunic of a spaceport labourer—was flung from the darkened corner into the light around himself and the pods.

The dead man was perhaps in his late forties, with dark hair and a thin ring of bristles around his mouth. From his belt hung a communicator, a blaster, a grapple cable and a small pouch—not usually the necessary equipment for a labourer. There was a scorched hole in the middle of the man's chest.

"Who is he?" Zak demanded. He was irritated now, irritated that his revenge had been taken from him.

There was still Alitha. And in a way, killing her would be avenging Tash as well. If their uncle hadn't been murdered, they'd have left Sullust safely. All of them. Tash would still be alive. Tash …

"His identity eludes me," Brakiss said with a dismissive wave. "And honestly, I don't care enough to find out. I do know that he was a Jedi Knight. Evidently, his intention was either to kill you both, or kill her and acquire you. I cannot fathom a reason for either. To my knowledge, neither of you are overly important."

Zak's glare came back. "Jedi?" he said incredulously.

He and Tash had met a couple of Jedi during the civil war against the Empire. The first had been Luke Skywalker. He'd been amazed at Tash's grasp of that mystical thing called the Force. Though he had been too busy with the war to teach her anything about it. And Yoda, a funny little creature on Dagobah, had said that both of them were especially strong in the Force. Zak dimly recalled being told by that strange hermit that the Force was an invisible power that bound the universe together. In fact, he had been starting to explore his own potential with Alitha when she had betrayed them and killed Hoole.

"You know Skywalker?" Brakiss asked curiously. He'd obviously taken the memory from Zak's mind. This man, too then, could use this Force.

"A long time ago," he said, looking back down at his sister and gently caressing her cheek.

She was cold, but Zak credited that to the stasis tube more than a time of death. That the wound in the Jedi still smoked a little led Zak to believe that it hadn't happened too long before his revival.

"We met on D'vouran. Tash really looked up to him, and I respected him and his companions a lot. I used to look to them as the kind of people who would bring peace to the galaxy. I'd heard stories of the old Jedi growing up, and after meeting him I remember thinking that he could do great things." Zak paused, took a breath. "But if his kind could do something like this to someone so …"

"Beautiful," Jaina offered when Zak choked on the word.

"Yes." He continued to caress her cheek in silence while the other two watched him. "If they could do this to her … Luke Skywalker wasn't the person I thought he was. Even if he didn't sanction this, that he'd allow someone like _that_ to join his Jedi is inexcusable! Inexcusable!"

"You're not the only one that thinks so," Brakiss said. He paused as Zak gently lay his sister down and forced his leg muscles to obey him. Slowly, he stood, and swiped away the tears that stung his eyes and cooled his cheeks before looking up at Brakiss again.

"What are you?" he asked the man. Brakiss had a lightsaber hanging from his belt. Jaina too, though hers was much smaller in design. He couldn't get passed how odd it was for a child so young to be so armed. And he remembered that Luke Skywalker had also had one of those strange laser swords. "Are you a Jedi?"

Then again, he considered, Darth Vader had also had a lightsaber. _He_ had most certainly not been a Jedi. "No," Brakiss said in a tone that was almost a snarl. Perhaps Zak's comment had stung him. "I am what is known to that antiquated order as a Dark Jedi. I was trained by an associate of Skywalker's, but I turned my back on what she tried to instil in me. In the eyes of the Jedi, I went dark. In my view, I came to understand that my own needs were more important.

"Jaina is my student, and, for all intents and purposes, my daughter."

"For all intents and purposes?"

"I'm an orphan," Jaina explained. She came to Zak's side and looked up at him. "Father found me abandoned on Coruscant five years ago. Abandoned by the Jedi."

"I've raised her ever since," Brakiss added, "and, seeing her enormous potential, have begun to train her in the ways of the Force so that she will have the tools she needs to see to her wants in the future."

Zak's gaze was drawn again to the infantile lightsaber at her hip. "The weapon is not lethal," Brakiss said, catching the gaze. "Merely for training. It will do no more harm to her or anyone she strikes with it than holding your hand over an open flame for a time."

Zak cringed. Painful indeed, but also not lethal just as Brakiss had claimed.

"Why are you telling me all of this?" Zak asked after a few moments of silence. "I appreciate that you helped me. I really do. But when you say that you put your own desires against those of others or that of a greater good, helping one boy trapped in a freezer seems to be a contradiction."

He was somewhat glad that his brain was working at proper speed now. His reasoning skills were coming back to him. And so was the suspicious mind born of dozens of conflicts with the Empire since losing Alderaan.

Brakiss and Jaina exchanged a look that Zak could not read before the former addressed him. "Because even in stasis I could sense your potential, boy. You're right to suspect my motives. Suspect everyone around you, it will keep you alive. But you have the potential to be one of the greatest users of the Force I have ever seen. If I could teach you to harness than power, you would be great indeed."

"And the catch?"

"Just eternal remembrance of who it was that taught you, who it was that freed you from your hell. I don't expect worship, or eternal gratitude. But if I need something, I would expect you to try to assist me."

"An alliance of self-interest," Zak guessed. When Brakiss nodded, Zak looked back over his shoulder at Tash's body. She looked almost asleep now, except for the fact that she was starting to pale. "And will you teach me?"

"That depends on whether you want to learn. I am capable of teaching you, surely. And I sense your desire for vengeance against those who have wronged you." Brakiss paused. "But if you decide that that path is not for you, then I cannot do half-measures. I cannot teach you some things and not others, and I will not teach you if you even consider there's a possibility of going to the Jedi later."

Zak growled. "I will _not_ go to those butchers! I want to learn all that I can about the Force. A Jedi Master once told me that I have a strong connection. I want to explore it. I want to _exploit_ it. I want to know what there is to know, and what there is yet to discover. I want power."

"The power to avenge her death? To find and kill the ones that ordered or even turned a blind eye to this Jedi's actions?"

"Yes!" The word was a growl.

He looked down when he felt something grabbing his hand. Jaina looked straight back up at him, smiling sadly with tears of happiness brimming. She clutched tightly to his right hand with both of hers. Though smiling, Zak could somehow feel the waves of sympathy coming from her, the desire to help him with his loss somehow, though she didn't know how.

"She seems quite fond of you," Brakiss pointed out. Zak looked back over at him as he gently pulled his hand free and laid it on her shoulder. He drew the little girl closer to him, and was somehow made better just by that closeness. It was almost like having Tash by his side. Almost.

"We're both orphans, now," Zak told him, and gently squeezed Jaina's shoulder to convey that he was grateful that at least she knew something of what he felt. "Will you show me the ways of the Force?"

"If that's what you truly want."

His eyes narrowed at the man, trying to gauge if he was being tested again. If he was, he wanted to let the man know that it wasn't at all appreciated. Brakiss could only glean the facts of Zak's pain from his mind by using the Force. He did not feel it, and Zak doubted he even sympathised. It was as if this man had hardened himself to the pain and loss of others, as if those issues didn't matter to him at all.

And he realised that they didn't. That was the core of what Brakiss stood for, the path he was choosing. Self-interest. The problems of others did not concern Brakiss, and they should not concern Zak. But to take that path meant to survive the pain he felt now, to harden himself to it, as much as that would kill him.

"That's what I want," he said decisively.

Brakiss's hand shot out and something made of metal was flung through the air at Zak so fast that it was naught but a blur. On instinct, Zak's free hand shot out ahead of it, and his fingers wrapped tightly around a cold, cylindrical, slightly studded surface before it hit him.

He looked down at it, and gasped. It was a lightsaber, though looking over at Brakiss, he saw that it was not his. A spare? Had he anticipated Zak's determination? Or … no. It had to have belonged to the Jedi. Revulsion welled up, but Zak stamped it down with reason.

He examined the weapon closely, allowed himself to become familiar with its exterior. It was polished, with blue rubbed grip strips encircling the fore-half of it. The pommel was braced with blue and thinned as it went along. Close to it was a round clip, a pair of lights—one green and one red—and a red button with a grey dial beside it.

Curiously, he held the weapon out with the pommel aimed at the ground and pressed down on the red button. A turquoise blade of energy shot out of the top end of it for a little over a meter in length. The glow of the lightsaber lit up the area around them all. The addition of the blade, Zak noted curiously, added nothing to the weight of the weapon at all. That surprised him.

"That is yours," Brakiss said before Zak could ask the question that next came to his mind. He still cradled his broken arm, but it seemed less stiff now than it had been moments ago, as if it had healed some. "Consider it your training 'saber, though it is far deadlier than Jaina's. You will not be getting another, so take care of it until you have mastered it and are ready to construct your own."

"So it _isn't_ mine to keep?"

"By all means do what you will with it. It is my experience from my own training, however, that a lightsaber should be built to complement and synergise with its owner. You may decide when you are ready that this one is good enough for you, and that will be fine as long as you're confident of that. But you may also want one that suits you more."

Zak nodded. "What happened to your arm?" he asked.

"You broke it," Brakiss responded plainly. "You tapped into your feelings of grief and hatred and your belief that I was responsible for your sister's death and used them as a weapon. Your feelings intensified to the point where your connection to the Force was beyond conscious thought. You reacted without intending to, and inflicted harm upon someone you perceived a threat without the knowledge of how."

"I … I'm sorry."

"Apologies are not necessary," Brakiss said with another dismissive wave. "The arm will heal. Another miracle of the Force. But that was your first step towards knowledge. You will be able to consciously harness that power one day. And those that would stand in the way of your ambitions will fall."

He turned on his heel and started towards the turbolift set into the wall that would take him back up into the house proper. Zak felt a small hand touch his own on Jaina's shoulder, and he looked down in time to see her wrap her fingers around his hand tightly. "Let's go," she said.

Zak almost started walking. But then he looked down at the lightsaber in his hand, and then over his shoulder at Tash's body, and he stopped, freed his hand from Jaina's little grip.

"I'll be with you shortly," he said. "I would like to bury my sister first. And say goodbye."

Though nothing more was said, Zak could feel the genuine understanding that came from Brakiss in that moment, and he was grateful for it. Jaina hurried off after him when she was sure Zak would be fine on his own.


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter**

**2**

**Two Years Later:**

She woke panting, sweat beading her brow and her hair a mess. But Jaina didn't pause; she jumped right out of bed and stretched.

Then she froze. The sun wasn't up yet. Moonlight from two of the planet's three moons shone brightly through the open window, stars still pinpricked the black sky, and a gentle, cool breeze fluttered the cyrene silk curtains. The breeze carried with it the salty smell of the ocean, and she took a deep breath of it before turning her back on the window to look around.

Something felt … odd.

With a flick of the wrist, Jaina summoned the Force around her and thrust a sliver of it at the light switch by the door. Light flooded the room, leaving no shadows for anyone or anything to hide in.

It took only a couple of seconds for her to confirm that she was alone. And yet, despite that, she still felt uncomfortable about the whole thing. Something still didn't feel right, and it wasn't just her being paranoid. Her father had taught her to be cautious, to trust in her feelings in the Force. That had wizened her far beyond her years, and yet there was still a sliver of fear that was present because of her age. She couldn't help that.

Besides, if Zak had taught her anything, it was that there was no sane person in the universe, regardless of age, species or experience, who felt no fear.

She took a deep breath and swallowed before opening the topmost bedside draw and retrieving her training lightsaber. She didn't activate it, but she kept it tightly gripped as she made a show of searching under her bed and inside her wardrobe. When she found nothing, she deduced that whatever it was that felt off must have been coming from outside her room.

She opened the door and crept outside, slowly and carefully. Her eyes darted from side to side down the hall, searching and finding nothing. She eased the door shut behind her softly, so that the latch made the quietest of _clicks_ as it shut.

The Force swirled around her. Though her grasp of it was feeble compared to father, it was still strong for a girl of her years. She could sense subtle nuances, even if she couldn't draw details from those nuances. She sensed something coming from within their home for sure, but she couldn't tell if it was a threat or just a presence. It _did_ feel familiar, of that she was sure, but it didn't feel like father, and not quite like Zak.

Curious, she started down the hall to her right, passing by the 'fresher door and the door to Zak's room before she reached the stairwell. She looked up first, reaching out with her senses to try and locate the origin of what she was feeling. The top floor was father's room and his private study, from which Jaina and Zak were forbidden to enter. It felt like he was sleeping fitfully, but even if that were the case it wasn't the cause of the strange vibrations in the Force that had woken her and was making her skin tingle.

She looked down, and almost immediately started down when she became sure of herself.

She passed through the modest entertaining space near the front of the house without pause. They rarely, if ever, hosted guests to their home, so the space saw little use. But it was decorated as a stranger might expect; comfortable lounge chairs, a caf table, some native tapestries, a couple of ancient-looking ornaments on a shelf below the holoscreen. A small kitchen was off to the side, with entry to a small, chilled cellar for storage.

Past the entertaining area was a doorway that led further back into the residence. Though usually open to allow a gentle breeze to funnel through from the open windows into the entertainment area at the front, the door was now closed. She reached out and firmly grasped the ornately carved handle and tried to turn it down, only to find that it budged no more than a few millimetres before the locking slip caught. She frowned and released the handle, putting her hands on her hips as she puzzled it over.

She could knock. There was always that option. It was polite, and something her father had really taken great pains to drill into her. She had a habit of occasionally disrupting his meditations, or his plans for a quiet, introspective afternoon simply by foregoing that nicety. On the other hand, curiosity made her wonder why the door was locked in the first place, at an hour in which her father and Zak should have been in bed and in which she could at least confirm the former.

Instead, she opted for the sneaky approach. Not only was it an exercise in satisfying her curiosity, but the situation presented an opportunity to practice her ability to manipulate small objects unobtrusively with her willpower. She had grown as skilled as she could for now in moving objects like boulders and felled trees, but her father had told her more than once that sometimes there was greater skill in affecting something smaller than in affecting something larger.

Though she didn't exactly take his words to heart, neither had she tried to actually practice the skill. She reached out broadly with her mind, sensed her father still in his room, sensed Zak … but not his location, which confused her. And of course, there was the strange feeling coming from beyond the door she faced. Twitch, the adolescent tusk cat she'd come into possession of a year ago, was sleeping soundly by the plexiglass door off to the side of the entertainment area; close to the building to guard, but also for her own comfort.

Having made her decision, Jaina leaned in towards the door and pressed her small hand against the fine-grained wood near where the lock should be. She reached out with her senses, tapped into the Force. The locking mechanism was simple—just a single latch that could be slid across. It had a deep enough niche in it to catch the stub on the inner workings of the handle, preventing the door from being opened.

She could see the mechanism in her mind's eye, as clearly as if the door had been bisected along its edge for her to discern the lock's workings by naked sight. The stub on the handle that caught in the lock wasn't very sturdy looking, but when she touched it with the Force, just a touch, she could tell that it was made from some pretty dense material. In fact, she was sure that it would take a powerful hammer-blow by the Force or destruction by blaster or lightsaber to damage it.

Well … her lightsaber was in her room and her father hadn't yet decided if he trusted her with a blaster not permanently set to _stun_, and she wasn't yet strong enough with the Force that should could just destroy the lock with a blow that powerful. Picking it would have to be her option; more precisely picking it by using her mind.

She grinned to herself mischievously and pressed her other hand against the frame, level with her other on the door, and extended her awareness. She felt where the end of the locking slip set in its slot in the frame, unmoving, unaware, and totally uncaring for how it barred her path. There were no trips attached, and no alarms that she could see or sense. It all seemed rather easy, and she began to doubt her father's words even more.

She extended feelers, intangible slivers of her mind, through the material of the door itself to the gear that would retract the slip of metal within the door so that it no longer obstructed her. She tried to touch it, gently, afraid that she might accidentally break it and thereby prevent her own access to the room beyond the door. Her slivers of mental power slipped over the gear without affecting it at all.

She frowned, retraced her path and tried again but with much more effort, much more mental strength. She drew on power, drew on more power than she had ever drawn on to lift a boulder nearly as big as their residence. She felt the psychic collision of her mind touching that small gear, felt and faintly heard the sound of one of the little arms being crushed to a fine metallic powder.

She panicked, withdrew her thoughts, and froze. What would she do now? Had she just ruined any chance of opening the door? She might now have to race upstairs and wake either her father or Zak and ask them to open the door to find out who or what was inside that made her feel so uneasy. She suspected an intruder, and there _were_ some valuable items inside that she knew of. She didn't know exactly how many of them were valuable, nor did she know exactly how valuable those she knew of were. She just knew that a thief would definitely have cause to enter that room, and could walk away hundreds of thousands of credits richer for it.

One more. Just one more go, she told herself, determined that she would not waste the others' time if her suspicions proved erroneous.

She took a deep breath, closed her eyes and performed a quick centring meditation to sharpen her focus and clear her mind of all distractions.

Suddenly, her senses were focussed on the door, and lock hidden within. She no longer heard the deep, even breathing of her tusk cat outside, nor the ever-so-faint snores of her father upstairs. She heard none of the nocturnal insects that chirped, nor the other night life that was usually loud and around in the forest around their home. She smelled not the sweat from her brow, nor the leftovers in the kitchen that hadn't been cleared away before the three of them had headed to their rooms. She felt not the plushness of the carpet between her toes, nor the cool air against her skin.

Focus.

Then she opened her eyes. She no longer saw the door. She saw the lock within. Her last attempt had broken one of the arms clear off, and that she couldn't find it by sight confirmed that it had indeed disintegrated. The handle was still slightly turned down from her attempt to open it earlier, and the stub was caught in the niche, sitting soundly and content to remain there, it seemed.

Father had been right, she decided then and there. Operating with smaller objects was indeed more difficult and required more concentration than manipulation of boulders and trees did. It required a fine level of focus she often lacked.

Already, she could feel the external distractions beating at the intangible door within her mind, trying to get her attention away from the task at hand. And already, she could feel that mental door giving, nanometre by nanometre. She didn't have long before her temporary focus was gone, and she didn't think she had the energy just then to summon it back if she lost it before the task was accomplished.

Gently, she removed her hand from the surface of the door and eased the handle back into its normal position. The stub slid from the niche in the locking slip within the door. She stuck her tongue between her teeth and concentrated hard on the gear that slid the locking slip back and forth. She started off with gentle probes, increasing slowly until she found just the right strength to move it without further damaging it.

The slip began to retract. She smiled, proud of her accomplishment. Then the broken arm almost ruined it all. It ticked over and the slip found its chance to spring back. Only a gut-reaction from Jaina kept it from sliding back to where it had been, and she moved it along with the gear—doubling her concentration—until the next arm caught on the slip's pegs. The latch slid all the way back until it was no longer obstructing the handle.

She released her hold on the mechanism, allowed her focus to fade. She was breathing hard, almost panting for breath, and a heavy sheen of sweat coated her forehead and plastered her shoulder-length hair to her scalp. She swiped at the sweat on her brow, brushed strands of stubborn hair away from her eyes, before reaching out and pulling down the handle to open the door.

She eased the door open only marginally, just enough to squeeze inside without, hopefully, alerting a possible intruder.

The room was darkened, but not dark, she found. Glow lamps against the walls were lit every odd number, and when she looked up, she at first thought she was looking directly at the sky. It only took a moment of thought before she realised that the ceiling had simply been set to its transparent module, allowing the room's occupant to examine the sky without physically leaving the house. The stars winked at her, and though from here she could not see the moons, their light shone down, rendering the glow lamps pointless by comparison.

The stone floor was unadorned, unpatterned, and seemed to be made from a single slab of smoothed stone. She knew different, and yet the affect still amazed her young mind.

There was indeed someone in the room, as she had suspected. But her suspicions of an intruder had indeed been wrong. She hadn't been able to sense Zak's location in the Force because he was employing a meditation technique he had developed himself completely by accident, a technique her father disapproved of. It helped one divide their thoughts, instead of gathering them, and allowed them to disperse their presence in the Force, rather than centre and focus it. In trying to initially learn a proper way to meditate, Zak had found himself unable to concentrate correctly and had discovered this method instead.

Though initially he had been using it frequently as a crutch for dealing with the death of his sister, recently he had been using it far less, and seemed to have finally accepted it and moved on. Jaina liked to think that maybe she had helped him with that. She felt sad for him for having lost his only remaining family. And while she knew she couldn't replace the sister he lost, nor did she wish to, she did wish that she could at least be a new sister to him, to give him someone to love and cherish like he had for the blonde girl, Tash.

Truth be told, sometimes she needed someone other than father to talk to, herself. Having Zak as an older brother figure had given her as much as she hoped she had given him.

So to see him using that method of meditation now, with his presence in the Force so spread across the countryside that any passing Force-sensitive would feel it and be drawn to it, and with his thoughts so disjointed she could touch him and he wouldn't register the contact, was a sad thing for her. She thought, deep down, that maybe he wasn't yet able to let go of his sister. That was the only reason she could think of that he would try to escape like this.

She walked towards him and lowered herself to her knees less than a meter from him. And then she closed her eyes and waited for him to finish.


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter**

**3**

Only a couple of hours had passed before something changed in Zak's presence. Jaina could feel the condensing of his dispersed thoughts, the swirling of the Force as it drew every facet of his mind back to a central point. It was almost like a vortex within her own mind.

When she could sense that he was centred, meditating properly, she opened her eyes to look up at him. She found him smiling, though his eyes were still closed and his breathing indicated that he had not yet broken out of his trance.

"Why are you not in bed, young lady?" he asked her softly.

"You woke me," she replied, suddenly realising that his strange meditation at such a late hour _had _been the reason she had woken in the first place. "And why are you not in bed, old man?"

Zak laughed, and his eyes snapped open, reflecting genuine good cheer down at her. In actual fact, he wasn't nearly old enough to be called old. Physically, biologically, he was only ten years older than she. But he had been born twenty-one years before she had, and spent eleven of those years locked away in a stasis tube, presumably never to be found again.

Calling him such names was something she did to reinforce their strong bond. They truly were becoming like brother and sister, and he had told her that his own relationship with his true sister had entailed a lot of cheery name calling. The practice had been inherited by Jaina. In fact, she found it quite enjoyable to see who would be first to run out of retorts.

But he grew serious after her question. While he didn't exactly frown, he wasn't smiling anymore, and his eyes darkened just a little at some memory she wasn't skilled enough to read in his thoughts. "I couldn't sleep."

She tried not to feel too saddened by his words. The way he looked, and the way he suddenly spoke made it clear his thoughts were once more on Tash. She felt a stab of jealousy, sure, but she beat it down and settled instead for support and understanding.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'll … go back to bed, if you wish."

But when she made to stand, Zak's hand shot out and grasped hers, firmly fisted against her leg. He held her there for a moment without saying anything. "Don't go." The pain in his voice was palpable, and she felt it pierce through her. But she heeded his request, and remained where she was.

"I apologise for waking you," he said. Jaina knew better than to insist that it wasn't a problem. It would only turn into an argument that neither of them wanted. And it would surely have woken her father, who would have been more than slightly irate at the interruption of his sleep. "I couldn't sleep, so I thought I'd meditate for a little bit."

"More dreams about Tash?" Jaina asked, even though it was obvious.

Zak nodded and closed his eyes for a moment before opening them again and forcing a smile. "Pitiful isn't it?" Jaina said nothing, but she did disagree. He must have sensed that in her however, because his smile drooped and he frowned.

"I should have gotten over her passing long ago," he explained. To Jaina's ears, it sounded more like he was trying to convince himself than assure her, though. So she sat there patiently. "I know I should never forget her, but I shouldn't still be mourning her. I should have moved on."

"Father still hasn't found the one responsible for ordering her murder," Jaina whispered. "We were talking about it the other day. He doesn't think it was Skywalker."

Zak snorted disparagingly. "One would think that an order founded by that man would share his views. The Luke Skywalker that I knew would have been angered by that act. So unless he's changed—become a monster like his father—why would he condone murder from one of his subordinates." He stood up suddenly and turned away from her. "He as good as ordered it by ignoring it."

Jaina remained seated, but she looked up at him. "Father says hatred can help with grief," she said, "as long as you don't let it fill you up so that you feel nothing else."

"I know." He sighed. "I know." He tilted his head to look up through the roof at the stars outside, and Jaina felt a sense of calm take hold of his mind, settle his thoughts.

"Let's go outside," Jaina suggested after a few minutes had passed in which they said nothing. Zak turned to look at her. "Twitch will be waking up soon. Maybe we can play with her for a bit until father wakes up."

"Anything to distract me from what today will entail," Zak said with a smile he didn't have to force.


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter**

**4**

A crowded marketplace would ordinarily be the last place that Brakiss would choose to visit in the middle of the week, and especially one located on the thriving world of Naboo. There were just enough Gungan merchants to make the place undesirable, and just as many from the rim worlds to make the aroma unbearable.

However, he had an appointment with the Queen in an hour, and, while not customary, he had thought it appropriate to ply her with gifts during such appointments in an effort to make her more receptive. The trick was to find something exotic enough that it would grab her attention, and at the same time bland enough that she would not be overly fascinated.

He'd known three queens of Naboo in his time, and each of them had been unique in their own way. Though he had had no dealings with the first two queens, he had known enough.

The first had had little respect for her own position, flirting with any and all suitors that came her way, unashamed of her behaviour, though they had turned the faces of her many councillors red with embarrassment. She had been ousted quickly, and the Naboo had forgotten her as quickly as they could manage it.

The second queen had been a hard young woman. She'd served a full term, and had insisted on the changing of certain laws that increased certain taxes, brought into existence a few others under the guise of trading tariffs, and made merchants' lives difficult. The decision had been unpopular enough that the people had been on the edge of rioting until the queen brought in laws that showed no leniency towards criminals; no second chances, no excuses, and harsh sentences.

All of those laws had been reversed when the third queen had been elected. She was fairer and less wild than her predecessors. She had come from a wealthy and well-known family, but was not someone that used her family name as a way to get her messages across.

Most importantly, at least to Brakiss, she was of marriageable age, and her parents were eager to set her up with someone after her term on the throne was up—she only intended on serving two terms, and was already well into her second.

Brakiss had no interest in marriage himself, not even as a political crutch. But he did know someone who would serve in that regard.

After half an hour perusing, he finally selected an authentic gold-weave necklace with a glass centrepiece, fanned by an impressive array of gems from Ilum and Yavin. After depositing a generous cred chip in the merchant's hand, he had the necklace boxed and wrapped, and then departed for the nearest speeder berth.

He was lucky, in that there was one speeder available. The pilot was a reprogrammed protocol series droid, and he gave his destination and waited as the droid piloted him to the palace with no idle banter. He selected another cred coin and slotted it into the reader when they arrived so that the correct amount could be deducted, then left the speeder and approached the steps.

One of the royal guards approached him, blaster pistol visible in its holster at his hip. He reached up and tipped the front of his cap slightly in greeting, then stopped just before Brakiss.

"Good to see you back again, Lord Brakiss," he said by way of greeting. "Another gift for Queen Emerela?" He nodded to the small box in Brakiss's left hand, which he handed over at once when the guard's partner approached with a hand scanner.

"Of course," Brakiss replied, not unkindly. "Would I ever be remiss in my courtesies?"

The guards chuckled and the second, an older man who's name Brakiss didn't know, ran the scanner in his hand over the box. It was procedure for all gifts presented to the queen to be thoroughly inspected for explosives or dangerous chemicals. Though the Naboo had not lost a queen untimely since the days of the Galactic Empire, he knew that they had learned hard lessons from Palpatine's rule. The Emperor had treated the people of his home world a little harsher than most of the other civilised worlds.

Brakiss had often wondered about that.

A beep sounded from the scanner, a sound familiar to Brakiss.

"I do wish your gifts weren't wrapped, my lord," the first guard replied. "I have been insanely curious to see some of the gifts you have presented her."

"I'm sure she has them on display somewhere," Brakiss replied airily, taking the small box back from the second guard and waiting as he started running his scanner over Brakiss himself, looking for weapons.

While he waited, Brakiss toyed idly with the idea of planting a suggestion in the younger guard's mind to break into whatever room the queen was displaying her most valued possessions. While the thought amused him some, he saw no benefit to it. The guard, who was one of the few that had taken a genuine liking to Brakiss and his "children" without any persuasion, would only lose his position—possibly his life if he was mistaken for an intruder and killed by another guard.

If anything, the young man would prove more useful where he was. And Brakiss did like useful.

Footsteps behind him alerted to the presence of others, approaching him and conversing in hushed tones. One of the sets of footsteps was slightly faster than the other, almost a skip.

He looked over his shoulder to see Zak heading over from the speeder pad, hand in hand with Jaina as—indeed, as he had thought—she skipped along. Zak's presence in the Force radiated irritation, concern for this whole charade Brakiss had convinced him to undertake. He wasn't pleased, and hadn't been shy in telling his guardian just what he thought about being pressed into an engagement with a woman he didn't know or care for.

Jaina beside him was flooding excitement into the Force. She had never been to the palace before—in fact, neither of them had—and had always wanted to see the queen. Jaina loved the queen much in the same way the Naboo did. And _that_ irritated Brakiss. He didn't want Jaina to love or hate the queen, because the people of this planet were a means to an end for all three of them. Caring only made betrayal harder when the time would come.

And yet, because it was expected of him as her "father", he grinned broadly at her enthusiasm. It was forced, but he was sure neither of the guards could pick up on that. Only a Jedi would have been able to tell the lie.

"Good morning, father!" Jaina called to him when they drew closer. A normal father would have been proud at the fact that her accent was so good, but not Brakiss. Even if Jaina hadn't grown up on Naboo, he would have had no doubt in her ability to feign an accent.

Zak, on the other hand, was the worrisome one. His Alderaanian accent was hard to miss. When he had brought Zak to Naboo two years ago, he'd spent months assuring the young man would be able to pass for local. That meant a lot of time working on his accent. Now, the only time Brakiss heard his natural inflections were at home, and even then sometimes he accidentally slipped into his Naboo accent.

But if Zak really wanted to upset Brakiss's plans for his attempt to woo the young queen with a suitor, it wouldn't take much for him to drop his accent.

It was a risk. Did Brakiss like risks? No. Not one bit. He preferred plans where there was nothing to doubt, no risk to take. He preferred absolute certainty. If there was something his former master, fool that she had been, had told him, it was that taking risks meant the uncertainty of success. Uncertainty of success was unacceptable. It was one of the few lessons of hers he had actually taken to heart.

"Good morning," Zak said, and all doubt of the young man's understanding of the necessity of their immediate goals fled from Brakiss's mind.

He nodded to them both and turned back to the guards just as the second one finished scanning him and turned his head to look at the approaching children. "Are they with you, my lord Brakiss?" he asked without looking away from them.

"My children," Brakiss said with a gesture that was meant to look apologetic. In actual fact, it was meant to serve as a focus for the gentle push he applied to the second guard's mind.

"They will have to be scanned as well," the older man said. His will clearly wasn't about to be broken.

The younger guard sighed and rolled his eyes at Brakiss who feigned stifling a laugh. "Very well," he said, cocking his head and stepping aside. He gestured Zak and Jaina forward. "Procedure," he told them, as if they hadn't been expecting it. "Everyone and everything going in gets a scan."

"Understood."

While they were being scanned, Brakiss stood off to the side, taking in every detail of their attire, looking for imperfections he could not allow for such an important meeting. He knew very little of the queen's personal tastes, but after months of negotiations with her parents, the last thing Brakiss wanted was for those talks to break down because the queen wasn't happy with the way her suitor or his family were dressed. Queens could be unpredictable creatures—even the good ones.

Jaina was wearing the dress he had bought for her last week. It was mostly white, with subtle shades of fuchsia and aquamarine around the trim lines. The skirt flared out a little at her ankles, but not extravagantly so. The sleeves extended to just the right point of her hands, rather than her wrists. She wore no makeup at all, but her hair had been styled to hint at one common among the nobles while still being a unique look. Every button was done, every fold pleated just right.

But then, how could he expect anything other than perfection from her?

Zak's suit was anything but common. Black and double breasted with a single tail, it was trimmed in gold spun fibres that the lower nobles wouldn't have been able to afford. His hair had been straightened long ago from the natural curls and was now brushed to the left and back. He wore regal gloves, which were intended to look as if they had been passed down the family line from a member of the family who had sat the throne several generations ago. On the forefinger of his left hand, he wore a silver ring with a crest on it that was supposed to represent their family.

The young man caught him staring and redirected his gaze from the guard scanning him to the man that had taken him in. He gave Brakiss an exasperated look, though whether he was feeling that way about the scan the guard was performing or Brakiss's examination of his attire, he couldn't say.

When the guard detected nothing on Zak, he ran the scanner over the diminutive Jaina, which took considerably less time.

"All clear," the old man said. He clipped the scanner back to his utility belt and reset the clip on his weapon's holster.

Brakiss resisted the urge to frown and Force-throw him against the nearby pillar. The man was cautious, perhaps a little _too_ cautious for his liking. He wondered about that, and made a note to ask the younger guard about it later.

The three of them entered the palace, with Zak in the middle and Brakiss and Jaina flanking him. Brakiss was only the negotiator in these talks. Zak was the prime attraction, and he wanted the queen to see that from the first. Jaina was there only because he had made an ill-advised promise to let her meet the teenager that ostensibly ruled the world.

Still, there was something he had to ask. Inclining his head only slightly toward Zak, he whispered, "You haven't foreseen how today will turn out, have you?" He was sure that Jaina would be able to hear him, but his intent wasn't to keep the question from her ears, merely those of the servants and guards they passed, and their escort, walking about ten meters behind them.

Zak turned his head one way, then the other, no more than a centimetre in each direction while maintaining a forward gaze. "Nothing," he said.

Brakiss's lips set a thin line, but he nonetheless didn't question the answer.

Zak Arranda's insight into future events had become startlingly clear in the first few months of his living with them on Naboo. He had been able to predict things Brakiss had not seen coming—mostly small things like market trends and the arrival of exotic goods or rare artefacts planetside. But more than once since then, the boy had entered a full-blown trance and predicted a major event that, more often than not, had no bearing on their life on Naboo.

"Perhaps that's for the best," Brakiss said confidently, projecting that confidence into the Force for them both to feel.

"Thought you preferred having all bases assured," Zak responded slyly.

Brakiss growled under his breath. "Surprises keep things interesting sometimes," he said, knowing that it didn't sound very convincing even to his own ears. "Especially when dealing with queens."

"That's silly," Jaina said, a little louder than was necessary for him to hear.

"Inside voice, dear," Brakiss commanded. With a little _oops_, Jaina put her finger to her lips and made a shushing sound to him. "Much better. And it's not so silly. Everyone in the galaxy has unique tastes compared to the people around them. For instance, Zak likes grazer meat"—Jaina screwed up her nose—"while you prefer nerf. Planetary leaders are expected to be a little more eccentric than the ordinary person."

"You say that like it's a good thing. The last two queens, from what I hear, weren't overly loved," Zak pointed out. A passing guard heard the comment and shot them an uneasy smile.

Brakiss reached out with the Force, touching the man's mind and erasing the memory at once. It would do their purpose here no good if they were reported to have been trash-talking the former monarchs of Naboo. It mattered not if those rulers had been ill-received by their people. Talking ill about them made it seem likely that one would talk ill about current rulers if they fell out of disfavour. Zak was to appear to be someone who would defend the queen, even in such circumstances.

He saw Zak squeeze Jaina's hand a little and then release it as they drew closer to the massive doors at the far end of the hall that granted entry to the throne room beyond.

"Why not?" Brakiss answered, frowning just a little. Zak still didn't have quite the grasp of politics that Brakiss wished he'd possess, not even after two years. "Eccentricities can be exploited," he added in lower tones so that only Zak could hear him. "I'm not intending this match to be a favour to either you or to the queen. This is all part of a greater plan to benefit the three of us in our stay on this world."

Had Brakiss not actively been using the Force to cloud his words then from everyone around him, he was sure someone would have heard at least some of it in passing. And _that_ wasn't in their best interests. Zak heaved a sigh and glanced sidelong at him.

"We're comfortable. Why must you have more?" he questioned.

"You seem to be missing the point, son," Brakiss said, adding the affectation in case somehow someone was still able to make out his words through his Force screening. "Would you prefer to live _comfortable_, or _content_."

"I'm pretty content with how comfortable we are," Zak hissed, his lips barely moving.

Jaina giggled, then, with a look from Brakiss, mimed buttoning her lips shut and said nothing.

"Are you content with not getting your revenge on whoever killed—ugh!"

A sudden pressure inside Brakiss's head made him lose focus, and his efforts screening their conversation fell short. A passing servant heard his moan of discomfort and stopped to aid him when he clutched the left side of his head, where the pain was greatest.

He waved the servant off impatiently. "I'm fine," he insisted at her fussing. "Just a slight headache. Will you kindly inform the queen that I'll be a few minutes?"

"Right away, Lord …" Yet another unfamiliar face.

"Brakiss. Just go."

The young serving woman scampered off toward the throne room without another word, and Brakiss stumbled to the nearby window ledge and leaned against it as he caught his breath. Jaina was by his side immediately, her hand over his as she poured support through the Force to him.

Zak merely took a couple of steps toward him and stopped. He was seething, Brakiss could feel it. He cursed his stupidity. Bringing up the untimely death of the young man's sister was a tactical arguing point for ensuring that the boy remained focussed on his desire for revenge, but it wasn't something that should have been used so openly. Zak was still touchy about his sibling's death. For Brakiss to play that card here, as a means of convincing him that marrying the queen would be good for him, was tactically unsound. Why Brakiss had even tried escaped him. It was just stupid.

"Keep your feelings in check," he hissed between gritted teeth. He rubbed his left temple vigorously, trying to push back against the pressure Zak was still applying to the pain centres in his brain that were still firing.

True to his prediction, it did take a few minutes for the young man to bring his anger under control. Though, when Brakiss turned to face him, his face was a careful mask of calm, touched with a little concern he didn't truly feel. He took a deep breath when the pain disappeared and let it out slowly, repeating the process three more times before he stood upright and straightened his suit and hair.

By then, one of their escorting guards had approached them, boldly, to inquire about the problem.

"Daddy's head hurt," Jaina explained as a girl her age might.

"I'm fine now," Brakiss insisted when the guard looked at him. "Really," he added when it didn't look like he was believed, "I'm fine. The pain is gone."

Everything was happening at once. Jaina was squeezing his hand, Zak was still staring at him, feeling like he wanted to physically strike him for the ill-timed slight, the guards were standing by, appearing a little uneasy, and the serving girl that had stopped to help was back with a message from the queen.

"Queen Emerela says that, if you like, she can reschedule and meet with you at a time that's more convenient."

Ah, sweet Queen Emerela, Brakiss thought. He reached out towards the throne room with his mind, touching hers just barely enough to detect the genuine concern she felt. She was a good queen. She genuinely cared for her subjects, it seemed. This match with Zak was something he needed desperately. Perhaps she would be able to steer him through his grief regarding his sister. She could help Brakiss in getting Zak's head straight.

"My father says he's fine," Zak said without looking at the serving girl. Brakiss was standing straight again, his confident aura returned as he turned towards the door at the end of the hall, ready to continue. "Though I would have him brought a glass of water."

"In the throne room," Brakiss insisted. "We have an appointment that can't be missed."


End file.
